Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, "Crocoite" to "Cuba" Volume 7, Slice 7

Part 27

Chapter 273,125 wordsPublic domain

When all is said, the Crusades remain a wonderful and perpetually astonishing act in the great drama of human life. They touched the summits of daring and devotion, if they also sank into the deep abysms of shame. Motives of self-interest may have lurked in them--otherworldly motives of buying salvation for a little price, or worldly motives of achieving riches and acquiring lands. Yet it would be treason to the majesty of man's incessant struggle towards an ideal good, if one were to deny that in and through the Crusades men strove for righteousness' sake to extend the kingdom of God upon earth. Therefore the tears and the blood that were shed were not unavailing; the heroism and the chivalry were not wasted. Humanity is the richer for the memory of those millions of men, who followed the pillar of cloud and fire in the sure and certain hope of an eternal reward. The ages were not dark in which Christianity could gather itself together in a common cause, and carry the flag of its faith to the grave of its Redeemer; nor can we but give thanks for their memory, even if for us religion is of the spirit, and Jerusalem in the heart of every man who believes in Christ.

LITERATURE.--In dealing with the literature of the Crusades, it is perhaps better, though ideally less scientific, to begin with chronicles and narratives rather than with documents. One of the results of the Crusades, as has just been suggested above, was a great increase in the writing of history. Crusaders themselves kept diaries or _itineraria_; while home-keeping ecclesiastics in the West--monks like Robert of Reims, abbots like Guibert of Nogent, archbishops like Balderich of Dol--found a fertile subject for their pens in the history of the Crusades. The history of a series of actions like the Crusades must primarily be based on these accounts, and more particularly on the former: narratives must precede documents where one is dealing, not with the continuous life of an organized kingdom, but with a number of enterprises--especially when those enterprises have been, as in this case, excellently narrated by contemporary writers.

I. _Chronicles and Narratives of the Crusades_--(1) Collections. The authorities for the Crusades have been collected in Bongars, _Gesta Dei per Francos_ (Hanover, 1611) (incomplete); Michaud, _Bibliotheque des croisades_ (Paris, 1829) (containing translations of select passages in the authorities); the _Recueil des historiens des croisades_, published by the Academie des Inscriptions (Paris, 1841 onwards) (the best general collection, containing many of the Latin, Greek, Arabic and Armenian authorities, and also the text of the assizes; but sometimes poorly edited and still incomplete); and the publications of the Societe de l'Orient Latin (founded in 1875), especially the _Archives_, of which two volumes were published in 1881 and 1884, and the volumes of the _Revue_, published yearly from 1893 to 1902, and containing not only new texts, but articles and reviews of books which are of great service. (2) Particular authorities. The Crusades--a movement which engaged all Europe and brought the East into contact with the West--must necessarily be studied not only in the Latin authorities of Europe and of Palestine, but also in Byzantine, Armenian and Arabic writers. There are thus some four or five different points of view to be considered.

The _First Crusade_, far more than any other, became the theme of a multitude of writings, whose different degrees of value it is all-important to distinguish. Until about 1840 the authority followed for its history was naturally the great work of William of Tyre. For the First Crusade William had followed Albert of Aix; and he had consequently depicted Peter the Hermit as the prime mover in the Crusade. But about 1840 Ranke suggested, and von Sybel in his _Geschichte des ersten Kreuzzuges_ proved, that Albert of Aix was _not_ a good authority, and that consequently William of Tyre must be set aside for the history of the First Crusade, and other and more contemporary authorities used. In writing his account of the First Crusade, von Sybel accordingly based himself on the three contemporary Western authorities--the _Gesta Francorum_, Raymond of Agiles, and Fulcher. His view of the value of Albert of Aix, and his account of the First Crusade, have been generally followed (Kugler alone having attempted, to some extent, to rehabilitate Albert of Aix); and thus von Sybel's work may be said to mark a revolution in the history of the First Crusade, when its legendary features were stripped away, and its real progress was first properly discovered.

Taking the Western authorities for the First Crusade separately, one may divide them, in the light of von Sybel's work, into four kinds--the accounts of eye-witnesses; later compilations based on these accounts; semi-legendary and legendary narratives; and lastly, in a class by itself, the "History" of William of Tyre, who is rather a scientific historian than a chronicler.

(a) The three chief eye-witnesses are the anonymous author of the _Gesta Francorum_, Raymund of Agiles, and Fulcher. The anonymous author of the _Gesta_ (see Hagenmeyer's edition, Heidelberg, 1890) was a Norman of South Italy, who followed Bohemund, and accordingly depicts the progress of the First Crusade from a Norman point of view. He was a layman, marching and fighting in the ranks; and thus he is additionally valuable as representing the opinion of the ordinary crusader. Finally he was an eye-witness throughout, and absolutely contemporary, in the sense that he wrote his account of each great event practically at the time of the event. He is the primary authority for the First Crusade. Raymund of Agiles, a Provencal clerk and a follower of Raymund of Toulouse, writes his _Historia Francorum qui ceperunt Jerusalem_ from the Provencal point of view. He gives an ecclesiastic's account of the First Crusade, and is specially full on the spiritualistic phenomena which accompanied and followed the finding of the Holy Lance. His book might almost be called the "Visions of Peter Bartholomew and others," and it is written in the plain matter-of-fact manner of Defoe's narratives. He too was an eye-witness throughout, and thoroughly honest; and his account ranks second to the _Gesta_. Fulcher of Chartres originally followed Robert of Normandy, but in October 1097 he joined Baldwin of Lorraine in his expedition to Edessa, and afterwards followed his fortunes. His _Historia Hierosolymitana_, which extends to 1127, and embraces not only the history of the First Crusade, but also that of the foundation of the kingdom of Jerusalem, is written on the whole from a Lotharingian point of view, and is thus a natural complement to the accounts of the Anonymus and Raymund. His account of the First Crusade itself is poor (he was absent at Edessa during its course), but otherwise he is an excellent authority. A kindly old pedant, Fulcher interlards his history with much discourse on geography, zoology and sacred history. Besides these three chief eye-witnesses we may also mention the _Annales Genuenses_ by the Genoese consul Caffarus,[64] and the _Annales Pisani_ of Bernardus Marago, useful as giving the mercantile and Italian side of the Crusade; the _Hierosolymita_ of Ekkehard, the German abbot of Aura, who first came to Jerusalem about 1101 (partly based on the _Gesta_, but also of independent value: see Hagenmeyer's edition, Tubingen, 1877); and Raoul of Caen's _Gesta Tancredi_, composed on the basis of information supplied by Tancred himself. The last two works, if not actually the works of eye-witnesses, are at any rate first-hand, and belong to the category of primary writers rather than to that of later compilations. Finally, to contemporary writers we may add contemporary letters, especially those written by Stephen of Blois and Anselm of Ribemont, and the three letters sent to the West by the crusading princes during the First Crusade (see Hagenmeyer, _Epistulae et Chartae_, &c., Innsbruck, 1901).[65]

(b) The later compilations are chiefly based on the _Gesta_, whose uncouth style many writers set themselves to mend. In the first place, there is the _Historia de Hierosolymitano itinere_ of Tudebod, which according to Besly, writing in 1641, is the original from which the _Gesta_ was a mere plagiarism--an absolute inversion of the truth, as von Sybel first proved two centuries later. Secondly, besides the plagiarist Tudebod, there are the artistic _redacteurs_ of the _Gesta_, who confess their indebtedness, but plead the bad style of their original--Guibert of Nogent, Balderich of Dol, Robert of Reims (all c. 1120-1130), and Fulco, the author of a Virgilian poem on the Crusades, continued by Gilo (_ob. c._ 1142). Of these, the monk Robert was more popular in the middle ages than either the pompous abbot Guibert or the quiet garden-loving archbishop of Dol.

(c) The growth of a legend, or perhaps better, a saga of the First Crusade began, according to von Sybel, even during the Crusade itself. The basis of this growth is partly the story-telling instinct innate in all men, which loves to heighten an effect, sharpen a point or increase a contrast--the instinct which breathes in Icelandic sagas like that of _Burnt Njal_; partly the instinct of idolization, if it may be so called, which leads to the perversion into impossible greatness of an approved character, and has created, in this instance, the legendary figures of Peter the Hermit and Godfrey of Bouillon (qq.v.); partly the religious impulse, which counted nothing wonderful in a holy war, and imported miraculous elements even into the sober pages of the _Gesta_. These instincts and impulses would be at work already among the soldiers during the Crusade, producing a saga all the more readily, as there were poets in the camp; for we know that a certain Richard, who joined the First Crusade, sang its exploits in verse, while still more famous is the princely troubadour, William of Aquitaine, who joined the Crusade of 1100. If we are to follow von Sybel rather than Kugler, this saga of the First Crusade found one of its earliest expressions (c. 1120) in the prose work of Albert of Aix (_Historia Hierosolymitana_)--genuine saga in its inconsistencies, its errors of chronology and topography, its poetical colour, and its living descriptions of battles. Kugler, however, regards Albert as a copyist, somewhat in the manner of Tudebod, of an unknown writer of value, who belonged to the Lotharingian ranks during the Crusade, and settled in the kingdom of Jerusalem afterwards (see Kugler, _Albert von Aachen_, Stuttgart, 1885).[66] In the _Chanson des chetifs_ and the _Chanson d'Antioche_ the legend of the Crusades more certainly finds its expression. The former, composed at Antioch about 1130, contained an idolization of the Hermit: the latter is a poem written about 1180 by Graindor of Douai, who used as his basis the verses of the crusader Richard (see the edition of P. Paris, 1848). It shows the growth of the legend that Graindor regards the vision of the Hermit as responsible for the Crusade, and makes the Crusade led by him precede, and indeed occasion by its failure, the meeting at Clermont (which is dated in May instead of November). Into the legendary overgrowth of the First Crusade we cannot here enter any further[67]; but it is perhaps worth while to mention that the French legend of the Third Crusade equally perverted the truth, making Richard I. return home in disgrace, while Philip Augustus stays, captures Damascus and mortally wounds Saladin (cf. G. Paris, _L'Estoire de la guerre sainte_, Paris, 1897; Introduction).

(d) William of Tyre is the scientific historian and rationalizer, weaving into a harmonious account, which was followed by historians for centuries, the sober accounts of eye-witnesses and the picturesque details of the saga--with somewhat of a bias towards the latter in regard to the First Crusade. He was a native of Palestine, born about 1130, and educated in the West. On his return he was happy in winning the good opinion of Amalric I.; he was made first canon and then archdeacon of Tyre, and tutor of the future Baldwin IV. (1170); while on Baldwin's accession he became chancellor of the kingdom and archbishop of Tyre (1174-1175). He was a man often employed on missions and negotiations, and as chancellor he had in his care the archives of the kingdom. His temper was naturally that of a trimmer; and he had thus many qualifications for the writing of well-informed and unbiassed history. He knew Greek and Arabic; and he was well acquainted with the affairs of Constantinople, to which he went at least twice on political business, and with the history of the Mahommedan powers, on which he had written a work (now lost) at the command of Amalric. It was Amalric also who set him to write the history of the Crusades which we still possess (in twenty-two books, with a fragment of a twenty-third)--the _Historia rerum in partibus transmarinis gestarum_. He wrote the book at different times between 1170 and 1183, when it abruptly ends, and its author as abruptly disappears from sight. The book falls into two parts, the first (books i.-xv.) derivative, the second (books xvi.-xxiii.) original. In the second part he had his own knowledge of events and the information of his contemporaries as his source: in the first he used the same authorities which we still possess--the _Gesta_, Fulcher, and Albert of Aix--in somewhat of an eclectic spirit, choosing now here, now there, according as he could best weave a pleasant narrative, but not according to any real critical principle. His book thus begins to be a real authority only from the date of the Second Crusade onwards; but the perfection of his form (for he is one of the greatest stylists of the middle ages) and the prestige of his position conspired to make his book the one authority for the whole history of the first century of the Crusades. Nor was he (apart from his reception of legendary elements into his narrative) unworthy of the honour in which he was held; for he is really a great historian, in the form of his matter and in his conception of his subject--diligent, impartial, well-informed and interesting, if somewhat rhetorical in style and vague in chronology.

[During the middle ages his work was current in a French translation, known as the _Chronique d'outre-mer_, or the _Livre_ or _Roman d'Eracles_ (so called from the reference at the beginning to the emperor Heraclius). This translation also contained a continuation by various hands down to 1277; while besides the continuation embedded in the _Livre d'Eracles_, there are separate continuations, of the nature of independent works, by Ernoul and Bernard the Treasurer. These latter cover the period from 1183 to 1228; and of the two Ernoul's account seems primary, while that of Bernard is in large part a mere copy of Ernoul. But the whole subject of the continuators of William of Tyre is dubious.]

To the Western authorities for the First Crusade must be added the Eastern--Byzantine, Arabic and Armenian. Of these the Byzantine authority, the _Alexiad_ of Anna Comnena, is most important, partly from the position of the authoress, partly from the many points of contact between the Byzantine empire and the crusaders. Anna's narrative both furnishes a useful corrective of the prejudiced Western accounts of Alexius, and serves to bring Bohemund forward into his proper prominence. The Armenian view of the First Crusade and of Baldwin's principality of Edessa is presented in the _Armenian Chronicle_ of Matthew of Edessa. There is little in Arabic bearing on the First Crusade: the Arabic authorities only begin to be of value with the rise of the atabegs of Mosul (c. 1127). But Kemal-ud-din's _History of Aleppo_ (composed in the 13th century) contains some details on the history of the First Crusade; and the _Vie d'Ousama_ (the autobiography of a sheik at Caesarea in northern Syria, edited and paraphrased by Derenbourg in the _Publications de l'Ecole des langues orientales vivantes_) presents the point of view of an Arab whose life covered the first century of the Crusades (1095-1188).

For the _Second Crusade_ the primary authority in the West is the work of Odo de Deuil, _De profectione Ludovici VII regis Francorum in Orientem_. Odo was a monk attached by Suger to Louis VII. during the Second Crusade; and he wrote home to Suger during the Crusade seven short letters, afterwards pieced together in a single work. The _Gesta Friderici Primi_ of Otto of Freising (who joined in the Second Crusade) gives some details from the German point of view (i. c. 44 sqq.). The former is supplemented by the letters of Louis VII. to Suger; the latter by the letters of Conrad III. to Wibald, abbot of Stablo and Corvey. The Byzantine point of view is presented in the [Greek: 'Epitome] of Cinnamus, the private secretary of Manuel, who continued the _Alexiad_ of Anna Comnena in a work describing the reigns of John and Manuel. It is from the Second Crusade that William of Tyre, representing the attitude of the Franks of Jerusalem, begins to be a primary authority; while on the Mahommedan side a considerable authority emerges in Ibn Athir. His history of the Atabegs was written about 1200, and it presents in a light favourable to Zengi and Nureddin, but unfavourable to Saladin (who thrust Nureddin's descendants aside), the history of the great Mahommedan power which finally crushed the kingdom of Jerusalem.[68]

Side by side with Beha-ud-din's life of Saladin, Ibn Athir's work is the most considerable historical record written by the Arabs. Generally speaking the Arabic writings are late in point of date, and cold and jejune in style; while it must also be remembered that they are set religious works written to defend Islam. On the other hand they are generally written by men of affairs--governors, secretaries or ambassadors; and a fatalistic temper leads their authors to a certain impartial recording of everything, good or evil, which seems of moment.